Margins
The Novel and Theatrical Imagination in Early Modern China book cover
The Novel and Theatrical Imagination in Early Modern China
2011
First Published
277
Number of Pages

Part of Series

The cultural fascination with and imagination of theater has long been overlooked as an important historical and literary context for reading Water Margin and Journey to the West . This study focuses on the concept of "the theatrical" to read those novels and their commentaries. Imbued with performances, playacting, spectacles, and spectatorship, the early modern theatrical novel borrowed heavily from theater to conflate the theatrical and the real, juggle theatrical roles, persons, and identities, and contest orthodoxies by challenging and appropriating sites of control and authority. This study showcases the theatrical novel's unique position as a new form of literati self-representation in response to the destabilizing social and political forces of early modern China.

Author

548 Market St PMB 65688, San Francisco California 94104-5401 USA
© 2025 Paratext Inc. All rights reserved